Not Friend, Not Foe

The relationship between the United States and China has been in a state of flux for decades, but the tensions and rhetoric of the last few years appears to have left the bilateral relationship tainted and semi-hostile. 

What has gone wrong with the current U.S.-China bilateral relationship? Why has the relationship deteriorated and became so competitive in nature?

Contrary to popular opinion, this relationship between the United States and China has not gone wrong. Rather, it is how parties are reacting to the shifting balance of power that has resulted in the current tensions, which leads to the notion of a renewed great power competition. Due to a heavy distrust between China and the United States, individuals perceive the current great power competition relationship in the wrong way.

Moreover, the United States and China employ both outdated and mismatched expectations of the other party that further feeds frustrations, distrust and impatience. Each of these seemingly minor factors have compounded to produce the soured U.S.-China relationship of today.

The current competition contains two themes that have never coexisted within any bilateral relationship in the past: 1) an irrevocable interdependence born from a globalized world order and 2) a genuine balance of power. Attempting to use past historical analogies for this case is inadequate to assess the current U.S.-China relationship and would most likely lead to inefficient conclusions, policy suggestions, and a potential global crisis. Additionally, it is detrimental to reason that the main factor of decline is ideological or political differences; especially when the two powers are as interconnected as the U.S. and China are at present, post-globalization. History has proven that differing ideological and political systems are not the ultimate reason for the destruction of bilateral relations, but can actually coexist well.

This report seeks to deeply explore the evolving dynamics in this unprecedented bilateral relationship by discussing the shifting balances of power within each of the significant realms (security, trade and economics, technology, etc.) related to the development of the U.S.-China relationship. It questions the sufficiency of utilizing the traditional case study approach when assessing a relationship as complicated and interwoven as the U.S.-China relationship under the context of renewed great power competition. Furthermore, the report points out that the insufficiency of historical case-study policy research itself is a source of misled judgements and disappointed attitudes that contribute directly to the unnecessary deterioration of the vital U.S.-China relationship.

Additionally, this report reevaluates the history and development of the U.S.-China bilateral relationship in the modern context. Contrary to conventional ideas, this paper treats elements of interdependency and elements of competition and cooperation as interactive and inseparable in the bilateral relationship. It summarizes the three major characteristics of the current U.S.-China relationship as 1) global, 2) multifactorial, and 3) complex. Lastly, it aims to present the foundation for a new framework for researchers and policymakers to apply when assessing this unique bilateral relationship with the hope to help develop a newer, more effective approach for the U.S.-China relationship in the future.

The latter part of this report presents this new framework: the Hydrangea Framework. The base premise of the Hydrangea Framework is to conceptualize, debate and apply the three significant characteristics of a great power competition in the new globalized context, such as the current one between the U.S. and China, for the purpose of supporting undisturbed development of the bilateral relationship. Instead of debating “what it should be” based on historical precedence, the report calls for policymakers and policy researchers to be more pragmatic and focus on debating “what it is” in reality of the present, ever-changing context.

This report ultimately argues that it is more important for policymakers and researchers to build up a comprehensive, macro-level understanding of the unprecedented reality in the current context prior to rushing into specific, micro-level realms of U.S.-China engagement with outdated relational understandings.